The cyclist is always wrong...

Has this been posted here before... Clear cut evidence that a motorist and the responding LEO lied about a situation in which a cyclist was hit by a left turning motorist... and lack of co-operation by the cop that writes a ticket blaming the cyclist.

Then the follow up in which the cyclist has to fight to prove his innocence, with city supplied video evidence...

Now it was time to take action against the claims that I was at fault. I returned to the Third District police station, where a supervisor told me that only the officer who wrote the report and the ticket could change it. He asked me to tell my story again.

"Wait, you mean, you were biking and you want a ticket canceled?" he said, incredulous. "We all know how bikers behave. It must have been your fault. C'mon. You are a biker."

The few times I have tried to report a driver putting me at risk, all I got was this attitude. What's more, it was usually accompanied by a lecture about how cyclists are supposed to obey traffic laws.

Any information, no matter how good, will always under-represent reality.

The few times I have tried to report a driver putting me at risk, all I got was this attitude. What's more, it was usually accompanied by a lecture about how cyclists are supposed to obey traffic laws.

And even when you do obey the laws... are you treated like a competent road user? Not according to this blog and video. Apparently the police in this case have an attitude that the motorist is always right... and ignore video evidence showing otherwise. Evidence gathered by the city... not the cyclist... that is the real irony in this case... the whole thing is caught on camera by an anti-crime camera in the area, and the "crime" is the motorist and the LEO lying about the cyclist running the light and being hit by the car. (cyclist did NOT run a light and the driver is in clear violation).

Tribalism is hard to overcome. When motorists break the law, about every block, it's because the law is wrong or there is some compelling need. (Heck, we even have that ridiculous 85th percentile speed law that prevents reasonable speed limits.) When a cyclist rolls a stop sign, at a lower speed than the average motorist runs the same stop sign, it is seen as evidence that all cyclists break all laws.

The attitude that the folks who kill 35,000 and maim 2,000,000 annually are doing everything correctly is indeed a problem. Any ideas what to do about it, short of forced re-education camps?

too many bikes from 1967 10s (5x2)Frejus to a Sumitomo Ti/Chorus aluminum 10s (10x2), plus one non-susp mtn bike I use as my commuter

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It's interesting how different laws are in various states.

There's always a pecking order in right of ways where conflicts exist such as when a vehicle makes a turn. Here' in NYS a car turning left is at the very lowest level in that order, and has to yield to everything except maybe a plane flying low overhead. A car turning left into a driveway is the lowest of the low, and would be presumed to be at fault in any collision.

Left cross accidents are very common, and except in the rarest of cases are the fault of the left turning vehicle (ie. car is waiting in an intersection and only completes the turn after the light changes). But the root cause of left car/bike left crosses are drivers who fail to see (or register) the bicycle, or more commonly don't account properly for the cyclists speed.

There's always a pecking order in right of ways where conflicts exist such as when a vehicle makes a turn. Here' in NYS a car turning left is at the very lowest level in that order, and has to yield to everything except maybe a plane flying low overhead. A car turning left into a driveway is the lowest of the low, and would be presumed to be at fault in any collision.

Left cross accidents are very common, and except in the rarest of cases are the fault of the left turning vehicle (ie. car is waiting in an intersection and only completes the turn after the light changes). But the root cause of left car/bike left crosses are drivers who fail to see (or register) the bicycle, or more commonly don't account properly for the cyclists speed.

And bike lanes that are buffered to the traffic side such that they push cyclists well out of the normal scan area for motorists making those left turns don't help matters any.

too many bikes from 1967 10s (5x2)Frejus to a Sumitomo Ti/Chorus aluminum 10s (10x2), plus one non-susp mtn bike I use as my commuter

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Originally Posted by B. Carfree

And bike lanes that are buffered to the traffic side such that they push cyclists well out of the normal scan area for motorists making those left turns don't help matters any.

You're right, which is one reason I'm not a fan of bike lanes. The other issue is that cyclists are often not attuned to what drivers see, think and do, and so are often caught unprepared to react (if there's enough time).

BTW the vid in the OP shows that no bike lanes were involved. So you can forget any BL arguments with regard to this whole thread.

The cyclist appeared to be in the middle of the lane or at least in the right tire track... the police attitude is what is the big problem here.

The cyclist really did everything right, other than suddenly "transport" out of the scene.

The interesting argument made by the cyclist is that the motorist said "you ran a red light" meaning the motorist saw the cyclist and then still proceeded to pull in front of him. Of course the video shows that the light is green. The light is clearly green, and this is evident by other cars coming through the intersection right after the collision.

BTW the vid in the OP shows that no bike lanes were involved. So you can forget any BL arguments with regard to this whole thread.

Don't worry despite that lack of them bike lanes are to blame. Despite the piles actually mountains of evidence that they are safe. They are somehow to blame. This is A&S where logic and reason go to die.

I'm not surprised at all. Since most cops are motorists and many spend the majority of their shift in a Crown Vic they see bikes as annoyance. Until cops are required to commute to and from work by mass transit and bike they won't or will refuse to see the hazards confronting cyclists and pedestrians.

I reported a cab driver today. For making an illegal left turn yesterday while I was about to make the same(not illegal) left turn. When I originally called about it yesterday, I was told a supervisor wasn't available. Today when I called, I was told a supervisor wasn't available because they were at a funeral for one of the managers' that died(they claimed).

Update: I talked to the cab company's VP yesterday. He said he would 're-educate' the cab driver in question.

...
The interesting argument made by the cyclist is that the motorist said "you ran a red light" meaning the motorist saw the cyclist and then still proceeded to pull in front of him. Of course the video shows that the light is green. The light is clearly green, and this is evident by other cars coming through the intersection right after the collision.

Hanlon's razor: Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.

Just humor me for a moment. Assume the motorist truthfully told the police officer the light was red. (In fact the light was green!) How could she possibly believe the light was red?

Go to 0:29. That's when the car heading East on W Street NW turns South on 14th Street NW. And that's when she *knew* the light was red without ever looking at the light. There were no further cars heading East on W St NW at that time. (And there was a brief gap in traffic heading South on 14th St NW.) She doesn't have to look West on W St NW because it's one way. She's only looking at *that* car, and as soon as it goes by, as she turns left she is now looking at a driveway into the gas station. She never ever looks North up 14th Street NW.

So she never saw the cyclist.

It would not matter if the cyclist had a blinky headlight, a steady headlight, a blue torch on his helmet shining at her, or his position in the lane. She never saw him because she never looked that way. If the 54 metrobus had been coming through at that time, she wouldn't have seen that either.

She doesn't even put on her brakes until after the collision. And she probably didn't know she hit a cyclist until she got out of her car.
But - she *knew* the only way the cyclist could hit her car is if he ran the red light.

And the light was indeed red - just on W Street NW. The car made a right turn on red. The cyclist in fact had the green.

She made a nearly fatal assumption. And it was just grace that she didn't kill someone that day.

To be absolutely clear, it was 1000% her fault. And 0% the cyclist's fault.

I reported a cab driver today. For making an illegal left turn yesterday while I was about to make the same(not illegal) left turn. When I originally called about it yesterday, I was told a supervisor wasn't available. Today when I called, I was told a supervisor wasn't available because they were at a funeral for one of the managers' that died(they claimed).

Just call them back and when they give you the same BS, just tell them no problem, you will forward the report and video directly to their insurance company. Even if you do not have video, it is good to make them sweat it out.

Just call them back and when they give you the same BS, just tell them no problem, you will forward the report and video directly to their insurance company. Even if you do not have video, it is good to make them sweat it out.

Agreed

I don't have video, but I will definitely be calling again tomorrow and Friday.

Profane words are integral for a complete daily vocabulary in many of today's families.
.... why I took up videoing instead of confronting. At least the cyclist was able to get more words into the conversation than what I did in my last motorist confrontation.

Maybe look again, attention to detail, the only person not understanding the cycling infrastructure in that video is the yelling clueless cyclist.

Again, the video clearly shows that a few road users either are not understanding, unfamiliar, or don't care about the marked cycling infrastructure. The cyclist is misunderstanding the meaning of the sharrows as a dedicated bike lane, and the motorcyclists are misunderstanding the markings in that it is giving them carte blanche to make unsafe passes around other road users within the lane, in which the bicyclist was initially commenting about.